Last week an officer who blatantly lied under oath was given her job back.. We’re talking about Marysol Domenici who was one of the first officers to on the scene at the Fruitvale BART station in Oakland, January 1 2009 when an unarmed Oscar Grant was shot in the back by convicted former BART cop Johannes Mehserle.

Domenici was fired after an independent investigating law firm Meyers Nave concluded she had lied about what took place the night of Grant’s murder. Domenici who had been on 15 months paid leave at the time of her firing, appealed via arbitration with the ruling she be immediately reinstated with back pay. The arbitrator, William Riker insisted that the prior investigation was flawed and that he saw no evidence that Domenici was untruthful.

Rulings like these have given people more and more reason to have little confidence in the justice system. What has taken place over the past two years around the killing of a Oscar Grantis something all of us involved with social justice issues will have to study for years to come. How can one be so meticulous in following every ‘proper’ step to seek justice only to see it thwarted at every turn?

Documents recently obtained by The Informant reveal the significant involvement of state and federal law enforcement in monitoring the various Oscar Grant protests in Oakland over the past two years.

According to internal Oakland Police Department documents about the July 8th protests that followed Johannes Mehserle’s involuntary manslaughter conviction, agents from the Drug Enforcement Agency, United States Secret Service, and the California Department of Justice were assigned to monitor crowd activities.Continue reading →

OAKLAND, California – As of 9pm, around 153 people have been arrested around East 18th St and 6th Ave in Oakland following the sentencing of Johannes Mehserle. The former BART cop was given 2 years for involuntary manslaughter – minus time served – for the murder of Oscar Grant. Mehserle may be released in as little of 7 months. The judge presiding over the trial decided not to apply a firearms enhancement charge, which would have added 14 years to the sentence. The police immediately declared the organized march unlawful and began trapping the crowd for mass arrest. At least one National Lawyers Guild legal observer has been arrested. During the march, protesters smashed shop and car windows, and one man was arrested for allegedly unholstering an officer’s gun and pointing it at him.

According to several observers, police did not issue a dispersal warning (and allow protesters to leave), but in fact corralled protesters and even some observers and then serially arrested them. One witness that had followed the crowd through out the course of the evening explained that as the marchers left downtown Oakland, they began to head towards the Fruitvale BART station where Oscar Grant was murdered. Repeatedly, police blocked the marchers off, riling the crowd. At one point, as the crowd passed Laney Community College, the police cut them off in an attempt to summarily arrest the entirety of the crowd. In response the bulk of the crowd tore down a temporary fence and scrambled through a construction site to circumvent an assured arrest. It was only later, after a string of antagonizing by police, did some marchers get arrested.

Update: Some, if not most, of those arrested last night are being released today. According to what the police at the jail were saying, the number of people arrested may be closer to 250 or even 300.

We have also gotten word that many of our comrades from Advance the Struggle have been arrested tonight, and we would like to express our solidarity with them, and with all who have been arrested.

As many have heard, a relentless anti-police movement has grown from the tragedy of Oscar Grant’s murder on January 1, 2009 by former officer Johannes Mehserle.* Recently, Mehserle was convicted of the deplorable charge of involuntary manslaughter, a weak charge which carries a sentence of probation to four years in prison.

When the news of Mehserle’s verdict reached the people of the bay area on July 8, the streets heated up in a style reminiscent of the anti-police riots a year and a half ago. Downtown Oakland swelled immediately after the release of the verdict. For hours after the verdict was released, people milled about, yelling at police, and listening to angry speeches. As the sun went down, the police moved in to end the spontaneous demonstration, threatening arrest of anyone who stayed on the streets. The sky was littered with helicopters and planes. Every police force in the region had gathered in downtown. Despite these threats, in the hours that followed, blocks and blocks of Oakland were wrecked, bank windows smashed, stores looted, and trash cans set on fire by people outraged by the state and society’s sickening disregard for Oscar Grant’s life, and by extension, those who are always the victims of police violence in the state’s constant war against people of color, women, and the poor. The night of July 8th, and long after the riots had ended, the Oakland Police Department as well as other Bay Area police departments, snatched at least 78 people from the streets.Continue reading →

On the day that the jury announced that Oscar Grant’s killer, Officer Johannes Mehserle, would get off with involuntary manslaughter for the obviously intentional murder of the young father people took to the streets in outrage. In the time leading up to the verdict all the media and local government could focus on was the “potential for violence,” ignoring of course that this is all about justice against one of the most violent forces around- the police. Of course, the city of Oakland was neverconcerned about people being hurt, but about the continued protection of their power and maintenance of the status quo.

So it comes as no surprise that there are widespread accounts of excessive force by the police against protesters that night. National Lawyers Guild members rattled off a list of abuses, including: violently attacking people who were nonviolent; arresting many demonstrators who did nothing wrong; holding people in jail who were arrested for minor offenses; deliberately provoking protesters; failing to protect small businesses; and violating a court ordered crowd control policy, as well as state and federal laws.

It’s clear by the behavior of the police that the intent here was to silence dissent and make an example out of those unwilling to accept a world in which the police get a slap on the wrist when they murder us.

Denver, January 8, 2010: At the same time that crowds started to gather in Oakland to respond to the verdict in the trial of BART police officer Johannes Mehserle, residents of Denver rallied in opposition to the murder of Oscar Grant and to the occupation of our neighborhoods by the police.

Denver Anarchist Black Cross put out a call for a solidarity demonstration to start at 7pm local time at the Sheriff’s Department headquarters at 13th and Cherokee in downtown. About 35 folks showed up with 2 hours notice with banners and signs that read “All cops are murderers” and “From Oakland to Denver, we will always remember”.

After spending half an hour at the Sheriff’s Department, the crowd moved to a busier intersection outside the U.S. Mint at Colfax and Cherokee. After another half hour, and many honks, raised fists, and cheers of support, the group marched to the corner of Broadway and Colfax, one of the busiest intersections in downtown Denver.

Honks, raised fists, cheers, and cries of support were constant. Folks that were waiting for the bus at the nearby RTD bus shelter motioned for the demonstration to come to the bus shelter. Cries of “fuck the police” echoed from the folks gathered at the bus shelter, as they swelled the ranks of the protest. For the next hour, the spirited crowd grew to over 50.

A couple of motorcycle cops made a small effort to intimidate independent journalists and photographers, but left shortly after being “schooled” by members of the crowd.

The action laid the foundation for more solidarity actions to come, and for a renewed energy in the local anti-authoritarian movement.